Fit Finlay d. Brian Kendrick in the Heat match. Finlay beat the piss out of Kendrick for about 2 minutes and pinned him. God bless Spanky, but I could watch Fit Finlay beat the shit out of guys all day long.

Coach is not on commentary, so this PPV is already rockin'.

An awesome video package opened the show. Only the WWE production team could get me interested in Mark freakin' Henry!

Kid Kash v. Funaki v. JAMIE NOBLE v. Nunzio v. Paul London v. Gregory Helms (from RAW) for the WWE Cruiserweight Title opens the show. At least the cruiserweights didn't get the death-slot this month. Gregory Helms won in about 7:30. Fun match while it lasted. London hit an insane Shooting Star Press to the outside on all guys. Helms hit Funaki with a shining wizard to win.

Vince hit on his girls. "Oh, and the little doggie too." YAY VINCE~! Orton picked his number and liked it. Hunter then came in, and told Torrie to open her box for him and then asked Candice to hold his ball. Triple H was not happy with his number. Hunter then asked for his ball back. Okay, Hunter ROCKED this segment.

Mickie James d. Ashley. Oh, this was bad. It went about 8 minutes, and that was 7:55 more than it should have went. At least Ashley was looking mighty hot tonight.

Big Show picked his number. He then told Mysterio that he appreciated him dedicating the match to Eddie, but it was every man for himself. Rey said he felt Eddie was gonna' help him pick a good number. Rey then picked a number and looked up as if to say "Oh Eddie, you silly prankster, you!"

Oh, and Vince McMahon is totally stealing the show tonight. He's just being so.... Vince. It is AWESOME!

JBL v. THE MOTHAFUCKIN' BOOGEYMAN is next. Boogeyman beat JBL in about a minute. The crowd was totally behind him. It was awesome. The Boogeyman ROCKS! Fuck anybody that says otherwise.

MAMA came in with Benjamin, and she wants some of Vince. Shelton liked his number. MNM drew their numbers, and they were SO MNM! It was FANTASTIC, including Nitro PUTTING ON SHADES FOR THE DRAWING! These backstage skits are worth the PPV alone.

Uh, the Royal Rumble match is NEXT? What the fuck?!?!?

Rey Mysterio won the Royal Rumble, last eliminating Randy Orton. Here's the list of entrants, with the number they exited followed by who elimiated them in parentheses.

John Cena d. Edge to win the WWE Title in about 14:00. Yes, they are closing the show with Mark Henry. Cena just got a giant entrance, big ass lights and scaffolding and pyro and shit. Oh, he's winning. FUCK~! Cena wins the title with the STFU. HHH v. Cena is the WrestleMania plan, and WWE isn't gonna' let silly things like fan reactions or ratings change that. What a great message to send. Edge wins the title, ratings go up, and his reward is Lawler to drive-home that he's a transitional champion.

Jim Duggan just called Lita a ho.

Kurt Angle v. Mark Henry for the World Title closes the show. No, I'm not kidding. No, I'm 100% serious. Stop laughing. Kurt Angle won with a schoolboy in 9:17. Not good. Undertaker then came down on a white horse, did some magic, caused lightning bolts to hit the ring, which caused the ring to collapse. That's why Mark Henry closed out the 2nd/3rd biggest show of the year. Because they couldn't have saved this angle for SmackDown.

Did anyone else notice that Chavo really wasn't eliminated? He went through the middle ropes on his way to the top turnbuckle when HHH pushed him onto the floor. You'd think he would have at least mentioned that to someone.

Gregory Helms's run as Hurricane was to seperate himself from the cruisers. Now that the post-hero RAW gimmick went nowhere, he gets the cruiserweight title. This makes him the second RAW guy to take a SD title in three weeks. And, you know, honestly, it's the best thing for him. Know your role, and shine your belt.

The Rumble was pretty good, but not at the level of the last three years' stellar Rumbles. Too much Triple H, and it really missed the guys who've carried a lot of it in previous years by doing more than just standing around, like Eddie, Christian, and especially Chris Jericho. Rey winning was great, except according to Meltzer even that will not work out like we want.

But those title matches. Fuck those guys. Which two guys were most responsible for the ratings the last three weeks? Edge and Ric Flair. How were they rewarded? They both got jobbed out hard. And the Rumble *and* John Cena's 'big' ("boooooooo") win ("booooooooo") had to take a backseat to a horrible Angle/Henry match so that Undertaker could ride a horse and blow up the ring with lazers? And he couldn't even beat Mark clean because they have to keep him strong? So lame.

I thought this was a good Rumble match. Not as good as the last two years. Better than 2002 though. Probably around the same as 2003 (2003 had a GREAT first half, but a boring as hell second half). Good Rumble. The best? No way. But good.

Can someone please explain to me why they ended the show with Henry vs. Angle in the joke of a world title match I predicted it would be? Holly/Lesnar all over again but at least they made the fantastic rumble match the main event this year.

Is there anything more to Rey's Royal Rumble win then Eddie's passing? Will Rey actually get a world title match vs. Angle at Wrestlemania? Will it even be the main event?

Yeah, a lot of it was a letdown, but I was too busy being entertained inbetween the letdowns to care too much. The Rumble match got too crowded, but other than that it was solid, with a fantastic finish. (That should have been last, but oh well.)

I too thought they picked the wrong guys to call the Rumble match, until Lawler had the line of the night saying Murdoch looked like a big bottle of milk. Plus, Joey was venturing into JR territory with all the name slip-ups.

The cruiser match was a blast. The Boogeyman match was kept blissfully short, but I'm curious to see if the guy can do ANYTHING in the ring. The women's match was bleh, but I expected that. And I laughed my ass off at the show-closing special effects.

The only really frustrating moment for me was Cena winning. And by tap out. AFTER ZERO OFFENSE. WTF? There were a million ways to get the belt back on him if that's what they were determined to do, but they picked the worst possible way to do it. Poor Edge.

Oh, and Cena's entrance was hilarious, only because the crowd was expecting anything other than him (like a debut perhaps), and pretty much scratched their heads when he came out after all the spaceship fanfare.

(edited by SchippeWreck on 29.1.06 2023)My mom says sigs are bad for you.

Originally posted by OmegaI thought this was a good Rumble match. Not as good as the last two years. Better than 2002 though. Probably around the same as 2003 (2003 had a GREAT first half, but a boring as hell second half). Good Rumble. The best? No way. But good.

Yeah, I'd agree with all that. 2003 had that awesome first half of workrate and then all the turds came in. This one didn't hit the highs of that one but it never got as bogged down either. 2004 was the best of them all (better than 1992). 2005 was really good with the high energy opening and the crazy finish. This one was okay with a very well done finish.

Originally posted by The Vile OneCan someone please explain to me why they ended the show with Henry vs. Angle in the joke of a world title match I predicted it would be?

So that they could blow up the ring in an angle that certainly couldn't be held off for TV.

They took the title off of Cena because he was getting booed, and now three weeks later they think everything is fixed and the people will shower Cena with appreaciation?

After their best three week run of ratings in almost four years with Edge as champ and Cena chasing the title, they decided that the best move was to job Edge to Cena, ending Edge's reign and Cena's chasing the title? Do they figure out the best move to make and then do the exact opposite or something?

He's got that hand-waving deal. He can become INVISIBLE! This means MONEY, Dawg! - AWARulz on Cena.

Rey's Rumble win means nothing until the E proves they are committed to him as a main eventer for the big show. According to Meltzer, that won't be the case, so I wonder why they just didn't go the more obvious route of H or Orton winning instead. And if Rey was booked to win before 3:00 PM today, why didn't they make the Rumble last? They're too dumb to realize the crowd was gonna shit all over the useless fat fuck Angle had to deal with? Apparantly so.

Cena wins the title back? Yup, H is fucking around again with his proboscis. There was no reason to cut Edge's reign short other than to put H in the RAW title match at WM. Edge/Cena would have been a money match for WM based on the ratings we've seen for RAW in the past few weeks. I expect things to plummet back down into the mid-3's tomorrow after tonight's result.

Barring the E showing to me that Rey will get his shot, this show gets a big fat thumbs down from me and likes it.

smark/net attack Advisory System Status is: Elevated(Holds; July 5, 2005)It's good to see that the WWE isn't backing away from Batista or Cena. There's still some questions lingering over a few of the draft moves they either made or didn't make (Jericho being a prime example), but the stage is set for a solid run to Summerslam that may send the indicator down. The longer Triple H stays away is also a plus...

Originally posted by JustinShapiroSo that they could blow up the ring in an angle that certainly couldn't be held off for TV.

(edited by JustinShapiro on 29.1.06 2326)

That seems like a silly reason to end the show on such a huge letdown of a main event.

Does anyone REALLY want to see Cena vs. HHH for the world title that badly? I guess the hope is that HHH can carry him, but the main event last year with Batista was boring, and Cena has seldom held up his part of a match since moving up to the world title ranks.

-The ball-drawing skits were much better last year. And shit, last year began with Flair & Eddie drawing (Flair getting #30 & Eddie getting #1), and this year began with Orton & HHH drawing (Orton getting #30 & HHH getting #1). Yay for originality, guys.-95% of the Rumble booking felt like it was cut & paste from other years, especially the first pair of guys (Benoit & Orton in 04, Benoit & Eddie in 05, Rey & HHH now) going through the majority of the match together.-Also, WAAAAAY too much standing around and holding onto the ropes.-Cena's entrance was way too overboard. Oh, and the Cena title match was JUST LIKE Cena/JBL at WrestleMania 21. Cena gets his ass beat down at the beginning, does his Five Moves of Doom and gets the pin out of nowhere. That said, Edge/Cena was a much better match than JBL/Cena...due to Edge being great.-Boogeyman rocks.-The Cruiserweights were match of the night. Great use of all of them.-And the Angle/Henry match rocked so much that I went to get food and missed 3/4s of it. Yeah.

I think I got more out of New Year's Revolution than this show. That may have been just because I was expecing more from one of the big four PPVs.

My question is this - is it just me or is Angle starting to look more like the wholesome Angle of lore than the evil weirdo we had to deal with in the past couple of years? The look on his face at the very end of the show just seemed so ... Angle.

Angle & Henry was about as good as it could be considering it was Mark Henry, who's legs are like tree trunks, arms like tree limbs (according to Lawler) and he has about the mobility of a fucking Redwood. But it was totally saved by the Taker cameo, and his little special effects thing.

YOu knew Cena was gonna win as soon as he got to use the cool ass stage thingy and Edge didn't. Although am I the only one who thought they shoulda used the blasts underneath to further pump up Edge's entrance??

Rumble was good, but the 3 open spots? Tatanka, Eugene, Goldust? BAH. Why not use that as the chance to bring Charlie Haas back as well. Shane & Vince screwing Shawn was good, and now they need to make the announcement that Shane is the new GM of Raw...to further along the "Screwing of Shawn Michaels" story. RVD looked good in his return.

No real complaints about the undercard, Boogeyman almost made the GF toss her cookies. The Cruiserweight match was cool as hell, and a nice way to move Helms over to SD, which has been rumored for what, the last 3 years??

All in all a good show, and a better building block to lead to WM than last year IMO, and sets up a lot of different possibilites and good ones at that.

I think they continue to build on the Cena/Edge feud, and let it last a while. The way HHH and RVD were going at it in the early stages after RVD's entry, I wouldn't be surprised to see a RVD/HHH angle.

Originally posted by Packmana better building block to lead to WM than last year IMO

Well, last year set up Batista vs. Triple H and Michaels vs. Angle. This year set up Cena vs. Triple H and Michaels vs. Vince. Advantage: last year.

2004: Undercard interactions set up Benoit jump to RAW. Actual match set up eventual Orton/Benoit feud; also set up Orton/Foley, Kane/Taker, Goldberg/Lesnar, Jericho/Christian, Show/Cena and the main event.